Domenico Ghirardelli, Sr. (1817-1894) was born in Rapallo, Italy in 1817, the son and apprentice of a chocolatier. In 1837, Ghirardelli moved to Uruguay, then moved again in 1838, this time to Lima, Peru, established a confectionery, and began using the Spanish equivalent of his Italian name, Domingo.
In 1849 he moved to California, upon the recommendation of his former neighbor, James Lick, who had brought 600 pounds of chocolate with him to San Francisco in 1848. Caught up in the California Gold Rush, Ghirardelli spent a few months in the gold fields near Sonora and Jamestown, before deciding to become a merchant in Hornitos.[1] In 1852, he moved to San Francisco and established the Ghirardelli Chocolate Company at Ghirardelli Square. When he lost his first wife he married Carmen (1830-?) from Peru. They had the following children: Joseph Ghirardelli (1854-?); Elvira Ghirardelli (1856-?); Louis Ghirardelli (1858-?); Angela Ghirardelli (1859-?); Eugene Ghirardelli (1862-?). Around the year 1865, Ghirardelli discovered that by hanging a bag of ground cacao beans in a warm room, the cocoa butter would drip off, leaving behind a residue that can then be converted into ground chocolate. This technique, known as the Broma process is now the most common method for the production of chocolate. Domingo Ghirardelli died in 1894 while on a trip to his birthplace in Italy. He was buried in Mountain View Cemetery in Oakland, California.
